This poster is a beautiful object, one that reminds me very much of the film itself; Jean Dominique’s interior landscape, the map of his inner world, of places unexplored except by imagination. What inspires me about the film, what makes me long for this object, is that connection between the power of imagination and what we know of the physical world and of the certainty of death. I think Julian Schnabel has found himself in Jean Dominique’s story, found a way to assuage his own fears and make something completely universal by visually re-imagining Jean Dominique’s experience, his words, as both a subjective physical state as well as a transcendent ideal that our minds are free, regardless of our physical bonds.

THE DIVING BELL AND THE BUTTERFLY struck a deep chord within me.

I really admire the movie, but I also think this poster is representative of what I like about Julian Schnabel as an artist. I love the use of red, the way it works against the fixed landscape of the map, bringing a messy humanity and mortality to the poster. It seems like a perfect image for the story, this chaotic feeling set against the rigid order of the map. It is truly beautiful.

I would love to hang this poster just above my nightstand, next to the bed. It seems like the perfect reminder to pay attention to my own dreams, affixed to the wall, next to my bed, anchored to the world.